KJ,
But FTR, do you support Habitat for Humanity or are you against it? With your statement in your post, I don't understand how you can be for it. I am for it and you guys are disagreeing with me.
As JB, I'm not wild about President Carter but I agree they do wonderful work, yes, I'm all for them, but my support for them as a private individual is a completely separate matter from whether someone has a right to housing enforceable against the government (i.e., you and me). First of all, as noted above, the phrase is not in the Constitution, including the Bill of Rights. Some might argue the Ninth Amendment, I suppose, but such an interpretation has no basis in our history or tradition. It is also not one of the enumerated powers of Congress in Art. I, Sec. 8. Secondly, the problem with such a "right" is that if taken seriously it becomes a right to take my money to enforce it. By government's stealing from me (taking money from me against my will) and giving it to someone else, that is not a just act, as the taking does not involve punishment for a crime I have committed. IMO, the BEST book anywhere on the subject of "social justice" is Friedrich Hayek's Law, Legislation, and Liberty, vol. 2, The Mirage of Social Justice where he demolishes the arguments of John Rawls, the chief defender of that concept (Hayek is not the only one to have done so, BTW).
Gold Dragon,
This would be true if poverty and homelessness were entirely because of laziness and lack of education about the value of hard work. While this is true a lot of the time, especially in North America, this is far from the case all of the time.
It still does not give someone the right to the fruits of my labor. (Edit: I just read your last post, GD)